Los Angeles Times headline
March 28, 2011

Dorothea Puente, 82, died at the Central California Women’s Center where she was serving a life sentence without parole. She was sentenced for three first-degree murder convictions for two life sentences. She was a Sacramento rooming house operator who was convicted of killing her tenants in the 1990s. She died of natural causes.

Who was Dorotea Puente?

At 64 years old, her grandmother figure was news throughout the country. Hers was a macabre story that included: victims buried in her Victorian home, a body found in the Sacramento River and; several heinous murders.

She was considered one of the coldest and most calculating female assassins who ever lived. She claimed that she drugged and killed her victims to collect their disability checks. The amount she stole amounted to around $87,000 which prosecutors say she had used for face-lift operations, among other things.

The firsts years

She was born Dorothea Gray on January 9, 1929 in California, USA. She had alcoholic parents: one father, who was a cotton picker, died when she was four (4) years old; and her mother, who was a prostitute, also died when she was six (6). She was sent to an orphanage after her mother’s death, where relatives claimed her several years later.

Conflicting accounts marked his early childhood. He stated that he had seventeen (17) other siblings. However, this was not proven: what was known was that his father had strange tendencies to point a gun at his head whenever he was drunk. It was also reported that she was sexually abused at the orphanage where she was staying.

At seventeen (17), he married and had two (2) children. The marriage was short-lived; since her husband died of a heart attack after two (2) years. She gave both children up for adoption. She was later caught forging checks in Riverside, but she was paroled six (6) months later.

the turbulent years

Shortly after she was released from parole, she was impregnated by a man she barely knew. She again gave the baby up for adoption. In 1952, she married a Swiss man named Johanson for the second time. The marriage lasted more than a decade and was marked by turbulence and marital disputes. She divorced Johanson in the mid-1960s and later married Roberto Puente, who was nineteen (19) years her junior. Her marriage only lasted two years as Roberto was often seen frolicking with other women.

Dorothea Puente’s fascination with running a rooming house began in the early 1960s when she was still married to Johanson. However, in that same year, she was prosecuted for running a brothel and was sentenced to ninety (90) days in the Sacramento County Jail. Her turbulent time stopped for a while when she found work as a nursing assistant; and as manager of a pension later.

Prior to the separation of her marriage to Roberto, she managed to take over a three (3) story, sixteen (16) bedroom house in Sacramento, California. She turned this into a home for the poor, the unwanted, and the homeless. She, however, took it upon herself to cash her tenant’s Social Security checks. And this propensity for government checks eventually led to her reign of terror!

The macabre years of terror

The strange stories began when neighbors discovered the ‘strange’ activities of a man named Chief, who was supposed to be Dorothea’s handyman. The boss was an alcoholic man and was often seen digging up clods of earth and removing them from the basement area of ​​the house. The base floors were then covered with concrete. After all this was done, the Chief mysteriously disappeared. There was no trace of him; And nothing was heard from him either!

Dorothea married for the third time in 1976 to another abusive man named Pedro Montalvo. This third husband of hers was another alcoholic; which contributed to the collapse of her marriage after three (3) months. Dorothea was next seen in pubs and bars attracting elderly people receiving pensions or benefits. She seized her checks, forged her signatures and cashed the checks herself. She was eventually caught and charged with multiple counts of fraud. She was released on bail, but she continued her illegal activities while on probation.

Paper trails of murders and illegal activities

Authorities said the series of murders began with the death of 61-year-old Ruth Munroe, who allegedly died of a drug overdose. She had about $6,000 when she moved in with Dorothea. She died two weeks later of a Tylenol and Codeine overdose, which doctors said was a clear case of suicide. A month after this incident, Dorothea was charged and convicted of drugging other elderly people and robbing them. Dorothea was sent to five (5) years in prison, but she was released three (3) years later. The terms of her release specify that she will have no contact with the elderly, nor will she cash government checks written to others.

Dorothea’s pen pal while she was still in prison, Everson Gilmouth, a 77-year-old man from Oregon, was very helpful when she was later released from prison. Everson was there to pick her up in her red pickup. However, her body was found later, dumped in the Sacramento River, some five (5) years later. Her pick-up truck was turned over to a handyman, whom she Dorothea hired to build a 6 x 3 x 2 box, supposedly to store books and other household items. The box was then nailed shut; and maintenance staff then helped Dorothea transport the box to a nearby storage area. However, she dumped the box on the river bank on the way to the storage yard.

One year later, the box was found by two (2) fishermen. They informed the police about the decomposing body they found inside the box. Meanwhile, Dorothea had been cashing Gilmouth’s boarding house check and wrote to her family members that he was ill and that she was unable to write the letters herself.

He continued with the boarding and lodging business that catered to the homeless and alcoholics. She cashed their checks and gave them a small amount of money, which they always spent on booze at a nearby pub. He then called the police and had them arrested. Dorothea then kept the rest of the money for her own use.

On November 11, 1988, the police were able to bury the bodies on the lawn of Dorothea, then 60 years old. On further investigation, they found several other bodies buried at the base. She was convicted and sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. She died in prison several years later, of natural causes.